Stress Is Healthy.... Sometimes... Right?

These last two days were a bit stressful.  

Actually, the last week has been a bit stressful.  

I had papers due in my classes (including one which took me MUCH longer than it probably should have.  I'll get to that in a minute), a presentation to give (A group presentation. However, when we were supposed to give said presentation, I was the only member to show up.  Awesomeness.), a test yesterday, plus another test and a midterm today.  

Holy friggin' cow. 

It just seemed like everything was happening at once.  

But, now that it is all said and done, I am super happy.  

I rocked my SOLO presentation, I kicked my midterm's butt, I know I aced the test today, and I feel much more confident about my test yesterday than I did after the first 

one I took in that class.  

Honest to God, I handed in my first test and, when my instructor asked me if I was stressing it, all I could do was nod because I knew if I tried to talk I was going to cry.  

She told me not to stress because it was over and there wasn't anything I could 

do about it anyway.  

I said ok.... 

and immediately walked out to call The Hubs and cry.  

No laughing.  

Yes, I cried because I felt like I bombed a test.  

No, I am not kidding. 

And I did bomb it. 

Well, by my standards I bombed.  

I got a "C".  

I know that doesn't typically qualify as "bombing" to most people, but for a girl who finished her last semester with all very high "A"s, getting a "C" is not ok.   

Especially not after spending hours studying for the damn thing. 

The good news is I did not cry yesterday.  

The better news is I feel like I actually knew some of the answers. 

 That is definitely a step up.  

I ended up feeling not only relieved that the test was over, but much less stressed about the one test I have remaining in that class.  

It gives me a bit of hope that I won't have to get perfect scores on my remaining assignments in order to get an "A" in the class.  

Fingers crossed.

My crap test score is what lead me to spend entirely too much time on a paper.  

I have no idea whether my instructor had planned to give an extra credit assignment or if she felt like she needed to because a large number of us did poorly.  

Either way, I wasn't arguing.  

I was going to seize the opportunity and take full advantage.  

I did the math & figured that, if I could manage to get all of the extra credit points, it would essentially increase my test score to an "A".  

All I needed to do was analyze a journal article and relate it to the content 

from our first test.  

Easy, right?

No.

My instructor is smart.  

Like, kind of intimidatingly smart.  

And I am not easily intimidated. 

Not only is she smart, she has high expectations for the amount of work you will 

put into her classes.  

What did that mean for my extra credit assignment?  

It meant I may have ended up over-thinking it.  

It also meant I would search online to find a journal article I was interested in, recognize how it related to the course content, and head out to find it...

At the McLafferty Annex...

Which is the overflow building for Morris Library...

And I may have gotten lost in those moving bookshelf thingies they have because I'm not intelligent enough to figure out what all of those silly numbers mean...

And I may have left with three different journal articles because I never could find the one I originally set out for...

And the guy working there may or not think I am completely out of my mind...

And I may have spent two hours there...

And five minutes or so may have consisted of me laying on my back, in the middle of those moving bookshelf thingies, spread-eagle, staring at the really high ceiling of the annex, thinking to myself, "WTF?!?!? How hard can this be?!"

Harder than I had originally thought, obviously.

And, that was just finding an article.  

I then proceeded to spend WAY too much time putting the paper together.  

Like, W-AAAAA-Y too much time.

But, at least I'm done.  

It was interesting to watch my paper go down the row, headed for my instructors hands, and see the reaction of the other girls in my class as they tried to wrap their fingers around the thick stack of pages I was handing in.  

I think writing something that long for extra credit was unfathomable to them.  

Not for this girl, though.  

Somehow, someway, I will manage an "A".  

Even if it means cleaning the McLafferty Annex's floor with the back of my t-shirt.  

Ahem.